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On Stack Exchange sites, I keep seeing answerers use "OP" to refer to the person who asked a question. I can't seem to find any enlightenment online as to what it means.

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The characters "OP" stand for "Original Poster", the person originally asking the question.

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    Also, somewhat less commonly, OP refers to the post itself; "Original Post".
    – Andrew Barber
    Sep 10, 2012 at 14:51
  • @AndrewBarber Ha, have a look at my revision history. I took it out because I could not find a reliable reference for it, so I assumed it might just have been me. :)
    – Bart
    Sep 10, 2012 at 14:53
  • ahh! hehe... nope, not just you!
    – Andrew Barber
    Sep 10, 2012 at 14:54
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    For newcomers (like me), it's a little disconcerting to be referred to as an acronym you don't understand.
    – kdavies4
    Jul 6, 2014 at 3:55
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    I thought it was originated from mIRC /op :)
    – Uri Abramson
    Oct 5, 2014 at 13:11
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    thank you, I was feeling ashamed to ask that in other stack...
    – DanielV
    Apr 14, 2015 at 12:27
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    Until today I really didn't know what actually OP stands for but I used it (for person asking question) many times to keep the discussion going and some how I encountered this post. Thanks.
    – vendettamit
    Oct 29, 2015 at 17:44
  • What is the non-Original Poster then? I would understand "QP" for question poster because the other posts are comments and answers, but from my point of view, OP is more confusing then helping.
    – Avatar
    Jan 14, 2018 at 8:49

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